Infinite Hope: July 2008

Monday, July 14, 2008

Need a Car. Got a car?

Hi folks!

I recently landed back in the Pacific Northwest’s summer. It’s LOVELY to be here, and even better to have a lovely summer wedding ahead of me!

While I arrived thinking that I had a car to borrow, it unfortunately fell through at the last minute. Now I have six more weeks here, in the midst of wedding planning and catching up with many of you. If any of you have a car I could borrow, or know of someone who does, please let me know. It would make my life A LOT easier if I had a more convenient, reliable way of getting around. Just thought I’d send my feelers out to you all…

Meanwhile, things back in South Africa continue along. All is going very well, from messages from the board of directors and Xoli, who’s now assumed the primary management role of Thembalethu. God has been so good to us over the past months (and years!). Let me give you an idea of the tremendous ways in which God has provided of late:

o We got our initial seed money, one year of funding (that we’ve stretched to 1.5 or so) from the Winterton Methodist Church. Additional donations have come in from UPC and other friends back in the USA. But that funding was looking to run dry by August/September. But that was then…

o Now we are the charity of choice for a golf day fundraiser which, due to the economic downturn, won’t bring in as much money as in the past years, but will give us a good boost to continue for months to come. The big day for that is August 22nd. We’re so grateful for these 8 guys who organize the event that in the past has raised as much as $19,000 for the selected charity. New funds to help the HBC care for the sick and orphaned in Amangwe/Loskop. Please keep this in your prayers as it will provide for our operating budget for the coming months.

o I also found out a little over a week ago that we received a grant from UPC that we applied for back in May. This will allow us to expand our work in an exciting new way – to help the sickest access anti-retroviral treatment when the stage of their HIV/AIDS and the government bureaucracy wouldn’t otherwise allow them a chance at living. Instead of requiring 5 weeks to expansion to the work we’ve already been doing

o About a year and a half ago, I was poised to return to the USA. Sad to leave South Africa behind, but excited to spend time reuniting with friends and family, and optimistic about the bigger pool of ‘fish’ available in a much larger metropolitan area than the rural area I’ve been living in South Africa. But that all changed last September when Eugene and I turned our friendship into dating. I’m grateful to have found such a wonderful, fun and godly man to spend the rest of my life with!

As for now, I’m back in the Pacific Northwest planning a wedding and starting to catch up with people. I’m working on a date or two for an informational night to share what I’ve been up to and the latest from Thembalethu Care Organization, the NGO we’ve just gotten registered. (Another big praise report!) I’ll send out those dates as they get finalized, which hopefully shouldn’t be much longer.

I hope to be able to catch up with you while I’m around the northwest. Send me a line if you’ll be free in the next couple of weeks and would like to catch up!

Blessings and hugs,

Betsy

__________________________

Betsy Elfers

Thembalethu Care Organization
Amangwe Tribal Area (Loskop)
KZN South Africa

PO Box 195
Tugela Ferry, KZN
3010
South Africa
Cell: +27 83 510 5562

** NOTE ADDRESS AND PHONE CHANGE **

Join me in Praying for the Amangwe Community

Praise God for the land granted us and the new building that we’ve managed to put up!
Pray for an end to the stigma and denial surrounding HIV/AIDS in the Amangwe community – For courageous local people to come forward and openly talk about the huge devastation of AIDS in their community.
Pray for God’s provision and equipping of Thembalethu as we move forward in the work God has called us to do.
Pray for health, provision and hope for the many sick adults and orphaned children in Sub-Saharan Africa.
Pray for provision and wisdom as we move forward to establish Thembalethu Care Centre as a place of hope and love in the midst of Amangwe Tribal Area.
Pray for the HBC mommas that they would continue to be encouraged by God’s word and the fellowship of other believers to continue to deepen in their faith journeys.
Pray that God would build up strong, godly Christian leaders for the Amangwe community.

Jargon Buster

Adherence Training - The required three-module (three day) training given to HIV+ people who are on their way to accessing ART. The three modules cover topics including basic HIV, healthy living with HIV, and ARV adherence. The focus of the third module is to emphasize the need for the patient to takes his/her ARV medication according to the prescribed schedule.

AIDS - Acquired Immune Deficiency Syndrome; starts out as HIV, then becomes AIDS as the immune system damage becomes evident and opportunistic infections arise. document.

ARV(s) - Anti-retroviral(s) the multi-drug cocktail of treatment for AIDS that converts it from a terminal to chronic condition.

CD4 count- The measure of immune system strength through a blood test. If below 200, the patient can access ARVs immediately, if above 200, the patient must watch their health closely, and recheck their CD4 regularly.

Drug Resistance - Poor adherence to ART can lead to a public-health emergency where HIV virus mutates to develop a strain resistant to the positive effects of the treatment.

Gogo - [Zulu] grandmother

HBC - Home-Based Care, a grassroots network of (mostly) mommas who voluntarily look after the sick and orphaned in their community. With good training, they can be the eyes of the community to identify possible HIV/AIDS patients, motivate and assist them in receiving support and treatment. They also have the potential of remaining life-long treatment supporters of their patients on ARVs to ensure good adherence to the treatment.

HIV - Human Immuno-deficiency Virus, a virus that attacks the immune system of a person. It often lives in the body of an infected person for years before it shows any symptoms.

Opportunistic Infections - Infections that take advantage of the body's weak immune system. Some of the most common in South Africa are tuberculosis, meningitis, pneumonia, and oral thrush.

TB - Tuberculosis, is a disease most commonly infecting the lungs, and the number-one killer of HIV+ people. TB has been around for centuries and today infects one-third of the world’s population, killing almost two million people a year.